


a shred of blue would be denied

by alynshir



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Drabble Sequence, F/F, Family, Found Family, Gen, Grey Warden Alistair (Dragon Age), Multiple Wardens (Dragon Age), POV Second Person, Reconciliation, Slow Burn, Warden as Inquisitor AU, Wardenquisitor AU, bi morrigan, hero of ferelden blasts off again, shay romances morrigan obv but there are other wardens who romance others!!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-21
Updated: 2020-01-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:13:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22343878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alynshir/pseuds/alynshir
Summary: In which the Hero of Ferelden is yanked out of anonymity when she attends the Conclave under the name of a clan she doesn't belong to, and in which she is forced back into the limelight, this time on the international political stage, with the world at stake.a Wardenquisitor AU series of drabbles/interconnected oneshots! Updated intermittently as I play through the game as my beloved HoF, Shay Mahariel.
Relationships: Alistair/Female Warden (Dragon Age), Female Inquisitor/Morrigan, Female Mahariel/Morrigan (Dragon Age), Fenris/Female Hawke, Leliana/Female Warden (Dragon Age), Morrigan/Female Warden (Dragon Age)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 28





	1. in which the ground is laid, and friends have a quiet moment

**Author's Note:**

> title from "A Shred of Blue", the codex entry :]

You wonder, often while pulling an Inquisition-green cloak tighter around your shoulders, why Fen'harel has chosen you to empty his hunter's bag of tricks on - what profanity you've committed lately to offend him. Lucky for you, you always find yourself thinking in kind, you suppose become something of a heretic as of late. What with the whole...Herald of Andraste, thing.

You never should have gone to that Conclave. You find yourself thinking this fairly often, but each time you do, you counter yourself - you were on a mission, and your mission had guided you there, no matter how indirectly. You sought to unravel the Blight, the Calling, the taint, to fix and be done with the things that made you the person you are today and the thing that most threatens your existence, and the existence of some you hold dear. It's much easier to do when there isn't a war going on dividing two incredibly powerful resources of information and power and ravaging everything in between, so when clan Lavellan had asked you to observe the events of the Conclave in exchange for the information and hospitality they had extended to you, it had been an easy decision. Your face is mildly off-putting at most, and virtually unrecognizable as Hero of Ferelden or Warden-Commander, thanks to years gone by, more interesting world players, and a misinformation campaign your favorite bard had delighted in aiding you in. Two birds, one stone, you'd thought.

You'd...thought.

Yet here you are, in yet another role you'd stumbled into and could care less about. Except you don't really have an option now, do you? With what's happened? Falling out of a tear in the sky with Andraste hot on your heels, a hand marked by the Fade with the sole ability to mend rips in reality...sometimes you'd really like to know who you pissed off, whether it be the Maker, or the Creators, or whoever it might be. You're not too sure these days, despite the sacred ink long since weathered through your skin.

Everyone looks to you for answers again, but this time isn't like the Blight; this time isn't just a cluster of people you'll grow to love, this time isn't you and your friends, your family, against the world - this time is you against the mob, and you hate it. You hate the way these people say your name, you hate the way people ask after you as if you're obligated to them in any way except of your own free will, you hate the demands the masses make, you hate having to be their hero, and you hate the clan they call you by. Leliana tells you that it's better this way; that to announce the Hero of Ferelden's hallowed surname at a time like this will be irreversible, and you will never know the privacy and the solace you have always sought, again. It's better for now, she says, to be seen as someone unrelated, to be someone blessed with an auspicious name that has simply grown in popularity since the slaying of the archdemon.

"Imagine the alternative," she says one night, when you're sprawled and sulking on your bed in the room you share with Leliana and Josephine for your safety's measure, situated beside the makeshift war room. "The Hero of Ferelden, who sects of faithful already believe to be sent by Andraste, falls from the Breach a decade later, once again a sole survivor with the only key to salvation - and she proclaims to be holy?"

"I wasn't a sole survivor last time. I had Alistair. And I'm not claiming any holy anything," you say, but you know that's useless, and Leliana stops her slow pacing and shoots you a look, her eyes shadowed with exasperation.

"You, maybe not, but the Inquisition, for good or ill, is running on it," she says, crossing her arms, "and you need to maintain that image as much as possible, at least until the Breach is closed and things are less volatile. We need as much support as we can get from those who believe in you. Even if you don't."

You groan, draping one arm over your eyes. Your left hand crackles - that's the only way to describe the sensation, like electricity crackling idly through your veins, and you flex your fingers, drumming them on your knee. You hear Leliana huff, and feel the bed ease down just a bit by your feet. She is leaning back against the wall; has pulled her hood back.

"This is so weird," you say, sitting up and moving to sit beside her - not too close, you mind; it has been years since you'd last been close with your old friend like this, and the years have hardened you both like the bark on trees, the bark that cracks and toughens with each winter.

"It is," she agrees, and she turns to look at you, and you see past the poised, pretty ways of a trained bard to see only weariness, only grief. "I wish I had known you were going to the Conclave. I wish I had heard from you before then. I worried. For years."

Your stomach twists a bit in apology. "I know. I'm sorry. I was trying to lay low, and I haven't talked to anyone personally about where i'm going in years. I didn't think."

Leliana purses her lips, and her nostrils flare a bit as she steadies herself, looking away from you. "Had things not happened how they did, I would have lost Justinia and you in one day. On top of the many others I knew who attended, and were lost."

"I know," you say, and that's not good enough, and the way she glances askance at you lets you know she agrees. There's a long silence. The wind whistles through the cracks and gaps in the poorly set door, and you watch the braziers wax and wane in response. She lets out a long sigh, leaning her head back against the wall, eyes shuttered as she gazes up towards the ceiling.

You shift a little closer, leaning your head on her shoulder. "I can't do anything about it now. but I'm sorry."

She doesn't answer. You nudge her. "If I'm going to so much as spit now, I'll keep you informed. Promise. Cross my heart."

Leliana snorts, the faintest shadow of a smile flickering as the firelight does.

"Please don't," she says, but she leans into you. "I missed you, you know. It was very rude of you not to write. The next time you're going to disappear for half a decade with my only nephew, let me know."

"Duly noted," you say, and your heart feels a little like it's breaking in one place and stitching back together in another.

You and your friend lean into each other, and exist with each other for a moment. Leliana smells of lavender and summer mornings, the same as she always has, despite the Haven smoke and sacred grief that's coated everything, and you haven't seen her in too long, and if you've cursed what's happened to you a thousand times over already, at least you're thankful for getting to see her again, getting to be near her. Even if she isn't so often alight with that same mischievous, reverent twinkle that carried you through the Blight more than you ever told her, more than you could ever figure out how to explain to her. That bit makes your heart hurt. You've never been the sort to deserve much one way or another from the world, but Leliana has always deserved a better hand than her Maker dealt her.

You feel Leliana tense a bit, although more in alertness than anything else.

"You said you hadn't spoken to anyone about what you were doing in years. I thought you were with Morrigan."

You're quiet, and Leliana moves back from you a bit, to better look at you as you look away from her.

"I don't want to talk about it," you mumble, because you don't, and you've done just fine not talking about it or anything for the last your-whole-life, and she scoffs, turning to face you.

"Well, I do," she insists, playfulness and genuine intrigue laced into her voice, and you can see the wheels turning in her head at your silence, and you stay quiet. "Shay," she says, and her voice softens as she says your name, and it's too close to pity for your liking. "Did-"

" _No_ ," you say, maybe a bit sharper than you should have, and you see her eyebrows shoot up, although she carefully arranges them back to kindness, back to neutrality. "Not...we didn't...it's not like that. It wasn't like that. We're still...it's still like it was. Kind of. It's fine."

(You assume it's fine. You haven't written much. She hasn't either. You'd both decided it was best this way, not to leave a paper trail as much as was possible. You've been gone for a bit over three years, now. You've gotten as many letters; on your birthday each year, from your son, with only the faintest, stilted postscript indicating his mother's involvement. You'd never been a good writer, but you'd written for their birthdays too, and sent trinkets that you could almost hear them both delighting over. That'd been all. That'd been all it could be. For safety, and for efficiency. And you suppose so you didn't miss each other too much. That last part hadn't worked.)

"It was better this way," you say to Leliana, and you can feel her eyes trying to peel back the layers of your voice, trying to understand the truth of the matter. "She had to do her thing. I had to do mine. When we're done, we'll figure it out."

Leliana nestles closer to you, more decisively this time, and you feel as she mock-forcibly pulls you near to her, the touch of the lay-sister you met in Lothering - impatient, affectionate, intuitive, compassionate to a fault. You let her pull you closer. If you just look at her and let the rest of the room blur away, you can pretend you're both ten years younger, under a Fereldan night sky, in a camp no one would ever be able to find on the map.

"Maybe you should reach out," she murmurs, and it's a half-baked thought coming from the Inquisition's spymaster, but this isn't Sister Nightingale talking as she muses onwards, this is Leliana, your best friend and one of the only people you can say you actually trust, one of the only people you'd die for. "Maybe you should let her know you're here, somehow. put it in some sort of cipher she'd recognise. i'm sure she could find her way here."

You shake your head just barely, and the wind whistles outside Haven's harrowed walls. The braziers flare, and then die down.

"She's got work to do. Important work. I won't pull her from it because I got myself into trouble again."

Leliana catches your eye, quirking an eyebrow, and there's a little mischief twinkling there, enough to make you smile despite yourself.

"If Morrigan came running at the slightest bit of trouble, I think she'd have to be chained to you."

You roll your eyes, and she pokes you in the side. "It's true. Trouble likes you. But Morrigan is a very intelligent woman. She can choose her battles. I would imagine, knowing her, she would prefer to know where her partner is and that she's alive."

"Maybe," you allow, "but not for now. I'll think about it."

"Do," Leliana says, and then with a groan she eases herself off of the bed and to her feet. "Try and get some sleep. I'll be in later. I'm going to see if I can't pry Josie away from her work long enough to eat something."

"Good luck," you say, and as the door closes, you let out a long, long sigh.

You won't write. You have things to do. She has things to do. Last you heard, She was somewhere in Orlais. That's where the letter seal had been from, at any rate. She's busy. And so are you, aren't you? You have a Calling to worry about, and a Blight, and now a Breach and apparently the fate of the entire world depends on your left hand. You're not the Hero of Ferelden anymore, or at least, if you are, nobody can know. To the masses that demand, you're just a Lavellan in the wrong place at the wrong time, and for now, you need to focus beyond yourself.

You fall asleep after a time, and your veins crackle with the flux of the Fade, leaving aches of long bruises you've done nothing to earn yawning across your skin. You dream of the Breach, of darkened eyes in shadowed mirrors, the Inquisition, the way your son's hair sticks up in the back, the song of the archdemon weaving a wicked web, your love's quiet laugh, the Breach, the Breach, the Breach. The Breach - that's all that matters - it's all that can matter.

For now.


	2. in which there are some icebreakers in the hinterlands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> thank u to lily for proofreading this :]

You _hate_ the Hinterlands.

Well, maybe that's not fair, you think, as you help pitch Varric's tent, and as he pretends to watch and learn. You don't hate the Hinterlands. You just hate that they're massive. And full of bears. And bandits and rogue templars and rebel mages. And that the forest doesn't get thicker than five trees clustered together at any given point, which makes stealth nearly useless. And that you can't go anywhere without being absolutely haunted by Inquisition scouts, or worse, one of Leliana's agents thinking you don't notice them. And of course, not to mention that massive dragon you're going to have to deal with at some point, because Mythal knows no one else will.

Okay, so maybe you do hate the Hinterlands. 

It occurs to you that you hadn't hated it ten years ago, when you and the only mentor sort of figure you've ever had, had travelled through it from the southern outskirts of your home, of the Brecilian forest, down to the shadows cast by Ostagar. On the contrary; you remember you'd never been so far south, let alone ever gone so far from your clan, and you'd spent the entire journey gawking at the world unfurling all around you, and pretending you didn't care at all. You'd been so angry then, so angry at the world and the scatter of knucklebones it had tossed at your feet, and the familiarity of that rage so many years later almost makes you laugh - what was it about this place that brought out the fire in you? You sigh, looping the burlap ties of the tent fabric around the tent pole. Oh, you'd been so resentful towards the man who, in the short time you'd known him, had saved your life in more ways than he'd ever understand and more ways than you'd ever get the chance to explain to him. You realize by the splintered bite of cheap wood that you're gripping the pole of the tent in a bit of a stranglehold, and force yourself to exhale. Even after over a decade, Duncan's loss still hits you somewhere under your skin, somewhere it hurts. You'd loathed him at least on the surface for most of the time you'd known him, and he'd never been the father figure to you that he had been to Alistair, but he'd saved you, and he'd seen something worthwhile in you that at the time, you'd thought completely vacant of you and completely ridiculous of him. He'd also brought you to the man who you'd eventually call brother, and sent you more or less directly to the woman who you'd soon decide to follow anywhere.

...except to some heretical marquisate in backwater Orlais, apparently. Leliana's voice needles at the back of your mind; _write her, tell her you're here, she'll come, you can go to see her, you can see both of them, just reach out_. You hush the nightingale on your shoulder, and decide to stop thinking entirely. 

You get Varric's tent situated, and he thanks you, swearing up and down that he's taken note of everything you did and he'll definitely have it handled next time. You know it's not true, but you don't care. You don't mind doing it; it makes you feel a bit more useful, a bit more like a person than an unlucky coincidence. You look out over the camp; it's nothing exciting, but still spat up on with Inquisition regalia, with tables haphazardly slapped together to serve as crafting and alchemical stations that you're never going to use, out of pure spite if nothing else. It occurs to you as you drop into a crouch outside of your own tent - one you brought yourself, not an Inquisition tent - that you hate this, too, actually. You hate this farce of camping, of holding some sort of line with a few shitty tables and banners to make you feel important when you'd frankly like nothing better than to feel fundamentally unnecessary. This isn't camping, you think, trying your best not to look irrationally disgusted as you watch two scouts who have clearly never started a campfire in their life, trying to get one going. It's not their fault they can't do it, of course, but they don't have to be here to begin with. You wish you could do anything lately without it being a public decision, or you'd have sent them away on day one out in the field. 

You ease out of your crouch. These scouts should at least learn how to start a fire, you think. It's for their own benefit. You're about to do something along the lines of educational when there's a snap and a pop, and the academically interwoven pile of wood and tinder erupts into merry, crackling flames, as good as any fire you've ever made. You have to bite back a laugh and feign indifference as the scouts nearly leap out of their skin in terror, and Solas catches your eye from across the way, his hand casually curled around his staff and a fiery twinkle playing across his serene features. 

(You're still not sure how you feel about him, honestly. He always looks at you like he knows everything about you. Maybe he does. You haven't forgotten the mocking undertones in his voice as he'd described the battle of Ostagar that you'd asked so innocently about. But if he does know anything about your identity, he hasn't said anything, to you, or to Leliana, or anyone else. You decide to tentatively respect him a little more.)

"Herald," he says, and there's something about the way his eyes crinkle that makes you think that if nothing else, he knows that you loathe your position. You can’t begrudge him knowing that one; you’d promised Leliana you wouldn’t dispute it too publicly, but you’ve never been an accomplished actress, or really much of one at all. The most you have to your name in this respect, is a poker face, but you haven’t gambled in years. your luck’s never been as good as your Game face. "Will you consider joining the party for dinner?"

"I always do,” you say, quirking an eyebrow at him, although you’re sure he can barely tell. At Leliana’s recommendation, your fairly distinct vallas’lin have been obscured under a bandana of pretty Antivan cloth you’d promptly crumpled and wrinkled beyond your bard’s belief. You don’t mind it, truthfully; your vallas’lin and you have always had a tense relationship, especially in the last decade. You’re not exactly sure what’s made you skeptical about a practice and a cosmology your people have held for generations. Maybe it’s been studying said culture and history for half a decade with someone who such beliefs didn't come easily to, but then again, on many of those particular adventures, you’d been the skeptic, and she the idealist. 

Solas raises his eyebrows at you, almost mockingly. He always seems to be laughing at you. ”Perhaps then, you could actually deign to speak with us, this time?"

Alright, that one’s fair enough. You’re not so used to taking meals with people anymore; the last time you'd done so regularly was when you were with your family, and it’s been a fair few years since. You’d kept mostly to yourself when staying with Dalish clans in your solitary travels, only ever existing on the outskirts of meals, and clan Lavellan had been no different - they'd been welcoming to _Ean'harel_ , Dalish hero of the Blight, but not so interested in Shay Mahariel, just one of many unknown Fereldan sisters. You'd been interested in kind; only at a distance; your business wasn't with them and relied only on their hospitality. The hermit-guest routine had worked out more or less fine up until the Conclave, but as far as manners go, seems to have left you a bit rusty. Something he'd said catches your ear, though. 

"Us?"

Solas has the decency, subconsciously or no, to duck his head a bit, but he's still got that stupid, smirking smile on his face, the one that says he knows whatever you're hiding.

"Of course I don't speak for Varric or Cassandra on all things," he says, glancing back towards them. They sit on rocks and exposed tree roots a small distance away from you, the tents, and the central camp, not quite together but sharing the same space. Cassandra is cleaning her blade in a way that strikes you as familiar; you remember Alistair using similar methods, similar motions once. You guess chantry training doesn't vary so much across their martial disciplines. Varric is talking; you can't make out what he's saying, but you can see by the way the twilight is shining against his side profile, the way his whiskey eyes are sparkling, that whatever it is, it's been crafted specifically to piss Cassandra off. Cassandra, to her credit, seems to be weathering it with only the slightest tense of her shoulders. 

Solas catches your attention again as he continues speaking. "...but I think it's safe to say that they agree with me that it would be good to know you better."

It's not an original concept, not by a long shot, and really, given your history with groups it’s one you should be fairly familiar with, but even still, you're surprised that the idea catches you off-balance.

"Why?"

Solas chuckles at that. "There are lots of potentials. Pick one. Maybe the reason you gave me in Haven - why not?" 

A scout interrupts you, looking nervous as he informs you that the personnel on-site have had rations dispensed to them. He hands you your small bundle of rations, does the same for Solas, and tells you that should you want the game you'd brought in earlier to be cooked for you, the fire is suitable for it. You nod in confirmation and thanks, trying not to bristle. This random scout has never met you, and would have no real way to know that you'd been able to start, maintain, and manage a cookfire since before your fifth year. It's not necessary to be angry, you tell yourself; he's doing his job, and you're being irrational. Accept the help, you can nearly hear Josephine counselling, and you can nearly see Leliana over Josephine's shoulder, nodding, her eyes touched with a bit of desperation, let the people think they get to know you, and then they'll work with you. It will make everything easier.

Let them get to know you. Ugh. Letting people get to know you is almost as bad as having feet full of splinters. 

(You would know. You hadn't started wearing full shoes until Ostagar, when Alistair had gently strong-armed you into doing it by telling you about the way the Wilds were half-drowned and everywhere one stepped was infested with leeches.)

You fold your arms defensively across your chest as you remember to respond to Solas mocking you yet again. ”I don't know. What about that privacy you mentioned?"

Solas shrugs at you. Somehow, even that is infuriating. He starts walking over towards Cassandra and Varric, expecting you to follow. You do, but because you want to. Not because he wants you to.

"You are the Herald of Andraste," he says, ignoring your instinctive scoff, sitting on the ground adjacent from Varric, resting his staff against his knees. You see Cassandra and Varric both tune into the conversation. "You have spent hours in Haven speaking with all three of us about our histories and our interests. Yet we are your sole companions for weeks on end, with little idea of who we travel with aside from your technical abilities as well as any speculations and conclusions we might draw from them. Humor the idea."

"So we're playing get to know Lady Herald, finally?" Varric chimes in, raising his eyebrows at Solas. "I can't believe you asking her worked."

"It hasn't worked yet," you grouse, although even as you say it you're sitting down between Solas, opposite Cassandra. You see Cassandra's lips twitch a bit, and Varric grins at you. It's a guarded smile, nothing more than a banner on the outside of a battlement, but it is curious, and welcoming, and more than you've given him, especially considering that you'd actually liked the dwarf immediately.

Yeah, okay, so maybe it worked. Whatever, Solas.

"So," you say, and you feel three sets of eyes on you, and you have to squash the urge to run away into the bowels of the Hinterlands, "What do you want to know about me?"

Solas, Cassandra, and Varric all look at each other. You pretend you're not considering taking your chances with the bears. At least the bears don't want to know things about you.

"Where are you from?" Cassandra asks after a moment, and you relax just a bit; that one you can field.

"Ferelden," you say, and it's not a lie, just incredibly vague.

"Anywhere in specific?" Solas prods, and you shift into a more comfortable sitting position. You unfortunately feel like you're going to be here for a while.

"Not really. I’m Dalish, we moved around." Again, not a lie. It just says absolutely nothing about you that they didn’t already know.

"I thought the Lavellan clan was mostly in the Free Marches," Cassandra says, her brow creasing slightly, and you nod because you can't very well deny something you don't really know the answer to.

"Yeah. They are," you say, thinking quickly, "but I was born in Ferelden, and I grew up here. so I'm Fereldan."

Leliana would be so proud if she could hear you waxing on just like a bard. You remember hearing her tales of court intrigue and clever talks and double meanings, and at the time, you'd been only asking in the interest of getting to know your friend. You still think you'd hate being a bard, or existing anywhere near mainstream Orlesian society for any extended period of time, but look at you! Handling yourself!

"Fair enough," Cassandra acquiesce, and you feel a little trill of pride, followed immediately by a little twinge of...you're not sure exactly what it is. Sadness? Regret? Something in the family of it? Here your companions are, trying to get to know you like you've been so persistently trying to get to know them, and here you are, proud of not being honest with them.  _ It's not worth feeling bad about,  _ you rationalize, _ it's what you have to do to keep yourself safe, and keep your family safe. they'd understand that, it's a need to know, thing. _

The presence of a scout jerks you out of the back of your head; he has plates of roasted ram meat, and passes them out to you, Varric, and Cassandra. Solas puts up a hand to deny it. You'd noticed his lack of interest in meat before, and while you're not exactly surprised - he seems like the very model of an elven vegetarian - you do grumble a little bit internally. That was perfectly good meat. You catch the attention of the scout and ask him quietly to make sure someone else gets the food and that it doesn't go to waste. You feel Solas' eyes on you, curious. You pointedly look away.

"Ah, the famous Ferelden special," Varric proclaims, poking at the meat, his lip curling back a bit. He saws off a piece and takes a bite. "...and it's been perfectly prepared - well-done and thoroughly underseasoned. Don't you think, Herald?"

You feel Cassandra's gaze snap to you, but not before you can bite back a snort.

"Author, spymaster,  _ and _ food critic? Lots on your plate," you say, cutting off a piece of your own meat. It isn't the best thing you've ever eaten, not by far, but frankly, you're not used to tasting your food much anymore, so it's kind of bizarre to notice. A faint tickling of a memory from a year or two gone by occurs to you; some lessons from a friend met and made on the path, and you wonder idly if there’s any way you can get some Antivan seasonings. Those, as you recall, make everything just a bit better.

"What can I say? I have lots of gifts," Varric says, shrugging, the smile on his face growing as Cassandra scoffs. "Aw, Seeker, you know it's true."

"I know no such thing," Cassandra says, and you can't stop yourself from smirking a little bit at your plate. You’d noticed the mint-condition, autographed copy of  _ The Tale of the Champion _ next to the Divine's writ in the war room.

"So, Herald," Varric says after a moment of moderately pleasant dinner silence, "do you have family?"

Oof. That one's a bit harder.

"I have my clan," you say, but you see by the way Varric leans back and the way Solas leans forward and the way Cassandra tries to pretend to look only mildly interested, that they’re not going to leave it at that.

"You wear a ring around your neck,” Cassandra observes after a second, and you have to stop yourself mid-motion from reaching up to touch it, to make sure it’s still there, to make sure it’s still warmed by an enchantment cast over a decade ago.

"Why does that matter?" you ask, as if you don’t know where Cassandra is going with this.

"It - doesn't, I suppose," Cassandra says, looking slightly sheepish, "it's just...a familiar custom. in Orlais. It…implies a partner. I wasn't aware the Dalish did it."

"They don't," you say, before you can bite your tongue. Your three companions all look at you, waiting for you to elaborate. You try not to groan, but lean forward a bit, your elbows against your knees. "I...yeah. I have family. They're not around."

Cassandra's cheeks darken a bit, and you see flickers of understanding, and far worse, understanding and empathy, in both hers and Varric's eyes. Solas doesn't say anything, just watches, the patient, familiar gaze, you realize, of a wolf waiting to see what you'll do next. 

(This somehow makes you like him more. Wolves, you know. You'd run with them for years, after all; back in your days as a young Dalish of clan Sabrae, you’d been  _ fen’nas _ \- a small, elite group of warriors that hunted with wolves. You remember your wolf companion with a tightness in your chest, with an old, healed sorrow that still aches when it rains. Your son carries her name with him now.)

“Forgive me," Cassandra says at your silence, "I did not mean to -"

You cut her off before she can apologize more. You hate apologies, and all of the slimy guilt and pity they almost always seem to carry. "They're alive," you say, "they're fine." Your heart falters, and shifts uneasily on the balls of its feet before resuming its rhythm. "I think." 

Leliana has tabs on them. she'd have said something if something was amiss. Right?

"Are they with your clan?" Solas asks, and you notice, even with the rising worry slowly leaking into your chest like it has been for weeks, that the question doesn't seem loaded for once.

"No.” After taking a deep, sharp, smoky breath in and out through your nose, you continue. "They're not Dalish."

You almost correct yourself, then, tell them that it's not entirely true; that your partner and your son became part of your clan when they'd taken your last name, that your son was more or less raised to be Dalish for the earliest years of his life, that he bears two Dalish names and that his first few words were all in your language and not the common tongue. But it doesn't matter, and you can almost envision Leliana shaking her head.  _ Too much, too soon.  _ Too many easy connections that could be made, especially in a party that has seen so much of Thedas and heard so many of the stories it offered.

"Will you... tell us about them?" Varric asks, as hesitantly as he gets, after waiting for an elaboration you hadn't intended to give.

"It doesn't feel safe to," you tell him, and that's maybe the most honest you've been with any of them since the very beginning of all of this. Varric's expression softens a bit, and you see the familiar shadow of something that you understand in the distance that he nearly slips into. There's an uncomfortable lull, and you can't shake that shadow off of your shoulders, out from under your eyes where it settles.

"There are two of them," you say, and the rhythm feels off when you do - the words come out faster, more desperate than you expect. You’re not sure why. "My partner, and my son."

Solas sounds surprised. "You have a son?"

Now it's your turn to look smug, you suppose, now that you've surprised him for once. It's just that thinking about your family turns that smugness, that sneer, into pride instead, and worry, and sadness, and love, and that ever-present yearning. 

"Is that so shocking?" you counter, and your hand goes to touch a necklace that simply isn't allowed to around your neck anymore. It's safely locked away in the secrecy of Leliana's things - the only place and person you'd trust with such a thing. On it hangs everything that you are: the heirloom necklace you'd been found with, your Warden's Oath, the fang of your wolf, the leather cord otherwise decorated with wooden beads precisely crafted in moments of spare time during the Blight, and adorned with one rough-molded clay leaf - carved with an uneven K in the stem. Living without the familiar weight of your necklace for the first time in your thirty-and years, has been uncomfortable at best, but again, always again, it's for the best. A Warden's Oath gives too much away on its own, not to mention the personal story the rest of your necklace tells. You and Leliana had decided early on that the only safe thing you could keep on your person was the ring Morrigan had pressed into your unconscious hand over ten years ago, an unassuming ring that many wouldn't give a second glance, the one that you wonder about lately, wonder if it still works, if its twin is still worn. Lately whenever the ring rests close against your heart, all you feel is a steadily growing frustration, and a constant undertow of nauseating longing. And you're pretty sure that's just you, and not the magic of the ring.

"Not shocking, exactly," Solas says. "I have spent time with the Dalish in my travels, though. They are not usually so welcoming to those who aren't Dalish, in my experience. And you have a son and a life with a non-Dalish. It is not shocking so much as interesting."

"I, um," you say, and Varric's eyes snap to you as your voice wobbles. You need to work on your lying voice. "My partner's just. Really charming. Won them over." 

You see Cassandra's lips tug into a skeptical purse. Shit. Morrigan is many things, but innately, instinctively charming to all those around her had never been one of them, and you're actually pretty sure that up until recently it'd been a source of pride for her, to be so off-putting. Although the little sect of the Sabrae clan settled by Ostagar hadn't really given her much of a choice other than to become family, though, especially once you'd introduced her and your then-infant son to Ashalle. Maybe it wasn't  _ so  _ much of a lie. Even if you’d made it sound embarrassingly like one.

"She's a talented herbalist," you tack on, "and a skilled tracker. My clan respects those with skill. so it was an, uh. Easier transition?”

This isn’t a lie; Morrigan is both of those things, and had provided assistance to your clan on occasion, especially during the time you’d stayed with them while Kieran was too small to be so constantly traveling. Morrigan hadn’t known how to sit idle and be useless, as Ashalle had insisted she be, and as a result had become strangely popular in the Sabrae settlement for her shapeshifting abilities, and for her unorthodox apothecary skills, and although she’d never tell anyone about it and still claimed not to know what you were talking about when you’d asked, you knew she’d been telling the clan’s children stories enough that they greeted her with  _ dirth’era,  _ storyteller, instead of  _ erelan,  _ mage. Maybe you aren’t giving her charm enough credit, you muse. 

At any rate, this addition to your answer seems to mollify Solas, and you see Cassandra's surprise, and a ferocious little bit of curiosity immediately pushed down by an attempt at a game face, when you say 'she'. Interesting. Maybe there's something to that. You'll ask Leliana if she knows anything.

"You could bring them to Haven, you know," Cassandra says, gently, after visibly swallowing a question that you humor might be about your partnership to a woman. "It might be safer for them."

"No." This isn't an option for you right now. You’d thought about making the attempt like Leliana's suggested, and you've decided that much. Wherever Morrigan is, is where Kieran is safest, and Morrigan is busy elsewhere. "They've got their own thing going. They're fine where they are."

Cassandra seems a bit dubious, and although you're sure she doesn't intend it, she glances to Varric - something you think is funny, because for all the prior antagonistic dynamic you've heard from them, she relies on him fairly frequently to make peace, to find common ground where she can’t fathom any existed.

Varric sets his plate aside, and you see him getting the message from Cassandra you’re not sure either of them are fully aware of. "Your family, your call. Do whatever works for you. but if that changes, Herald, no one'd say anything against it. And if they did, I'll talk on your behalf. I've got people I want to keep safe, too. I get it." 

"Thanks," you say, and it sounds dry, but your chest hurts a bit at the kindness these people who don’t know you, know less about you than they even think, are extending nevertheless. “Thanks,” you say again, and you mean it. You get to your feet, standing, stretching, picking up Varric's plate and collecting Cassandra's. "Okay. Talk about me time is over. I’ve got restocking to do so none of us die tomorrow." 

"You know one of the scouts can do that, Herald," Cassandra says, and you can’t resist rolling your eyes a little, stacking the plates and the ration wrappings into one portable pile.

“They could, but they won't, because I want to do it myself. And…” You turn towards the three of them, balancing the pile in one cradled arm. “For the record, please don't call me that. I hate it."

(You know you promised Leliana and Josephine you wouldn’t push. But these people are going to be your companions for who-knows-how-long, you think, and being called “Warden” by your friends was one thing, but that thing at least was true, was earned, and was often used in order to keep your personal identity safe, not to show respect or reverence. You think if you have to listen to anyone showing you reverence one more time just because you fell out of a rip in the sky with a screwed-up hand, you might just climb back into the sky and take your chances.)

"It's your title,” Solas points out, but you look back over your shoulder at him and you see his eyes twinkling, and you know he already couldn’t give a shit about calling you by a title. “should we not refer to you by it? or would you prefer ‘your Worship’?”

You shoot him a death glare. He smiles inanely back at you. You take back the respect you’d afforded him earlier, and instead, you think you hate him. You grumble. You also hate that you don’t hate him. Oh, the plight of you befriending every shithead apostate you meet. they always have to be shitheads, it seems.

"I don't want that, either. if any of you call me _ that  _ one, I’m leaving you to handle the bears on your own.” 

You pause, idling. you’re not good at talking, or leading with words like they expect you to. The Blight was really more just following the treaties, and solving problems. That was doable. This time feels like a position with a bit more to say and a bit less of having Alistair and Leliana and Zevran at your side to be natural, to be charming, to talk to people and win them over so you didn’t have to. You hope none of these new people expect wisdom from you. “If we're going to be...traveling together all the time like this, I don't want to be called that. Just use my name.”

Varric wrinkles his nose. "Calling you Shay is weird. You look like you need a badass title. Some kind of cool nickname. Shay just doesn’t have that star-power, you know?”

"I'm good without titles and star-power,” you say, thinking about how you already have multiple titles that are much better sounding than “Herald”, and for all Varric knows, they belong to someone else. Honestly, you’d be good without being called a name at all, or most preferably, just not being spoken to unless urgent. “Calling me Shay is perfectly fine."

"How about Lavellan?" Varric pitches, and you grimace, thankfully out of his visual range.

“Maybe not,” you say, wry, “I’ve got one, how about Shay? my mom thought it had pretty good star-power.”

"Eh, for now. I'll workshop a nickname that works for both of us,” Varric compromises, and gets up, following you back towards the camp proper, grabbing the dishes out of your hand, heading towards the small cluster of Inquisition personnel. “Give me time. By the time I learn how to put up my own tent, I'll have a nickname that the Maker Himself will be jealous he doesn’t have.”

“Get back to me on that,” you say, and as you ignore the slapdash alchemy table, settle down outside your tent and begin unpacking your satchel, as you methodically remake the familiar territory of poultices and tonics, the berry-darkened sky gives way to night, the fire crackles, your companions bid you goodnight one by one, and leave you alone with the fire, the awakening stars, and the wind whispering through the trees. 

You feel very slightly less alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> follow me on twit @witchesgonewild to see random screenshots of the next installment amidst a lot of yelling!!
> 
> All elvhen is pulled from either the game directly, or FenxShiral's lexicons. The concept of "fen'nas" is something I made up for Shay back in DAO, but then in DAI they make reference to something similar to it in the Emerald Graves, so I think that's a sign from Bioware that I am in fact, OP. 
> 
> also minor reference shout out to @maleficaregrets' Warden/Witcher brother of Shay's, Samir, and the impromptu cooking lessons Samir gave Shay!

**Author's Note:**

> follow me on twitter @witchesgonewild for more yelling! follow me on twitch at https://www.twitch.tv/alynshirslover to see Shay go through DAI live :]


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